The aim of this study was to analyze the qualitative structure of the questions constructed for county contest
in written Biology exam and to determine the teacher's assessment of selfcompetence for development of
problem-solving competence among the students and how much they are helped by expert meetings in this
development. A closed type survey was conducted for this purpose and a written exam conducted in county
contest of Biology 2017./2018. year was analyzed, which was attended by 141 students from all Croatian
counties except from Ličko-senjska county. Written exam contained 81% second cognitive level questions
while the remaining 19% were first and third cognitive levele questions. According to the index of easy, 44%
of the questions were estimated as easy, 41% as ideal and 15% as heavy. When solving written exam 28% of
students achieved a success rate of 50 to 60%, while 27% of students achieved a success rate of 70 to 80%.
By analyzing solved questions ragarding to gender in first cognitive level questions, male students achieve
statistically significant better success than female students, while among the counties statistically significant
differences occur in solving second and third cognitive level questions. Conducted survey showed that
teachers consider themselves partially competent for development of problem-solving competence among the
students and that they were partially acquierd during initial education and partially by expert meetings.